Posted
by
timothy
on Saturday May 05, 2012 @03:29PM
from the such-poor-use-of-pronouns dept.

longacre writes "Suzy Harriston wanted to be friends on Facebook. The profile said she was from Clayton [Missouri] and had more than 300 friends, many of them from Clayton High School. No one seemed to question who Harriston was. That is, until the night of April 5, when a 2011 grad and former Clayton quarterback posted a public accusation. '"Whoever is friends with Suzy Harriston on Facebook needs to drop them. It is the Clayton Principal," wrote Chase Haslett.' Suzy Harriston quickly disappeared from Facebook, and Louise Losos, the principal, subsequently took a leave of absence, and then resigned."

It grates badly enough on old ears to hear "they" and "them" be used for singular

Only if you're a moron. The practice dates back to at least Chaucer, presumably earlier since it's unlikely he invented it. 'They' has been the gender neutral singular since Middle English. It's a lot older than you are, so I can only conclude that it grates on your ears because you never read any proper literature in the English language (like Shakespeare, Jane Austen, or George Bernard Shaw). The idea that it shouldn't be the gender neutral singular is a fabrication of 19th century assholes. Don't be like them.

n stories like this, it's almost never worth reading the article, and the summary is usually wrong anyway. The reporter spent 400 words to expand a 40 word brief, and then another 600 words on a story that is only vaguely related because the principal apparently used the fake profile to spy on kids who supported some guy who was fired.

Having read this article closely, now I feel sorry for Ms. Bock that she's got such a shitty beat...

Ms. Bock did more than just puff up a story - there was the fact-checking of school records to see if there was such a student, as well as a search of public records for ANYONE with that name. That's more than what passes for "reporting" on Faux News.

She also put it into the greater context of the on-going school board problems.

I went to school with this woman, her older sister was in my class and IIRC they both went to Harvard. My point in saying that is that I'd always had the impression that these were smart ladies. Certainly older sister is, I believe she is a scientist of some sort now. I really don't keep up with people from high school.

We went to a public high school in a nice part of St. Louis, Louise went back after college and taught there for 8 years apparently.

If you google her name you will see her LinkedIn page pop up. You can see she has an extensive background getting her degrees, including a Ph.D.

She is plenty smart to know better than to spy on the students. If she just had to know what was going on in her school, she should have actually taken the time to get to know people and talk to them. To me this is only common sense.

No telling what happened to that in her 25 years of education/work since she left high school. People change, but I dont see where it is right to spy on kids on Facebook. As a matter of fact, I find it rather nosy and a bit creepy.

Clayton, Mo. is a wealthy city just immediately west of the city of St. Louis itself, so they will do everything to cover this one up and pretend it never happened.

By posting it online to a social networking site you're not keeping it private and you have no expectation of privacy [law.com] (here too [ediscoverylaw.com]). It's a giant site dedicated to sharing information, it's not a phone booth, or a rest room, or job interview [facebook.com].

If you want to talk to your friends or brag about drugs, skipping school/work, lying about a disability [marketingpilgrim.com] etc. why not do it the old fashioned way? Writing it down leaves a paper trail; which is why when privacy is concerned things are done face to face.

The overall trend of the judiciary seems to be moving toward greater permissiveness for e-discovery with regard to social media, as well as a strong likelihood that privacy concerns will be outweighed by the weight and relevance of the information.